I was allowed to help take down the flag at Ft. McHenry during the evening Retreat Ceremony. One of the others (it's a BIG flag!) was descended from someone on one of the warships which bombarded the fort back in the day. He thought it funny that he could help haul down the flag while his ancestor had tried all night without success.

Hey, with all of the war and battles you guys hash and rehash, has any of you traced the steps of battles in the War of 1812? Today would be a good day to start. If you traced Lewis and Clark's steps, this should be just up your alley. A bit more moving in circles, though, I imagine.

My son called me on Father's Day and said thank you for all t6he wise instruction which he had ignored over the years, as he was now discovering, hard though it was to admit, that Dad was right about most things. I told him I had been working on the wrong assumption, to try and tell him the rightest things I could think of, when what I should have done is give him calculatedly terrible advice, counting on him not to take it. I told him it was OK, though, his brand of intransigent self-determination runs in the family.

It was a good talk!

Last night we went to a party to celebrate two graduations of some dear friends of the younger set; amazing what a bright, high-energy creative and thoughtful generation we have coming up behind. I feel optimistic about the future of humanity when I see these guys operating.

Just for those who don't know, the French Croix de Gare is one of the Stations of the Cross in the French version of reality. They also have a Croix de Guerre for people who fight well on the correct side.

Poor old crippled up disabled veteran, alone and forgotten, his memories fading like the medals that he has....

Did I ever mention my part in the Battle of the Atlantic? I was conning a destroyer, escorting a convoy, fighting a Force 7 gale in early December. The North Atlantic is cold that time of year and a hot cup of coffee is sometimes the only thing that keeps you going. Suddenly sonar reported a U-boat waiting ahead! I rang General Quarters and full speed. We got off a cluster of hedgehogs and then rolled three. Sonar reported sounds of break-up and an oil slick slowly appeared on the surface. We radioed COMATLANFLT about our success and received a warm reply. A very warm reply, since it was 1967 and the West German government was somewhat upset about the whole thing.

The ditch was dug, the pipe repaired, the planting holes made right and the new plantings planeted--a voracious and ebullient bougainvillea in the corner and three small Ceanothis plants that will rapidly grow wide and tall and vivid blue. Then we laid down stones around them to act as heat sinks near the stems and mulch outside the stones, and gave each of the Ceanothus thirty gallons of water as a kickoff. They are native plants and will never see or need that much water again, but this is a recommended starter technique. I crawled into bed aching in joints that weren't designed to be joints and muscles that God never intended me to find, but the job was done.

Home despots anonymous is a very fine idea, LH. I should think they could take up worm farming to compensate for having driven away all their families.

Hot and muggy here today. Will one of you guys set up the sprinkler next to the wading pool? I think we'll be in and out of the water today to stay cool. And be sure the cooler is filled with ice and beer.

A quick news bulletin: I've had my friend Susie's chocolate lab here since January 12 (hit by a car - shattered pelvis, head injury). She has been out of the hospital for a month now, but we know Zeke is too strong and could easily knock her over.

A stray min pin turned up at my back gate last night, wanting to go play with the dogs. I bathed him, put him in the wire kennel, and this morning Susie and I took him to the vet. His chip led to a previous owner who relinquished the dog when he learned Susie would like to adopt him. Max is 5 years old, 13 pounds and is like walking a yoyo on a string. Zeke is still here with me and my dogs, and Susie has a dog companion again. I'm sure over time all of the dogs will get together, but for now, we'll let Max get used to walking just with Susie.

MOM just blubbered quietly in her beer when I told her this happy little story!

It's for home despots who have been deprived of their primary role in life when the people living with them all moved away and left them alone, rattling around in an empty house with no one else to rule over despotically.

Can you imagine the despair and feelings of purposelessness that follow? Think of Hitler or Mussolini trapped on an island with no other people around to command and you get the picture.

A lonesome home despot can, of course, get a dog or cat to boss around...dog usually works better for this...but it's nothing more than a bandaid approach to what is really a very serious and devastating psychological problem.

Lonesome Home Despots often react to their plight by viciously defending their outdoor property against all trespassers such as squirrels, birds, dogs, cats, chipmunks, bugs, neighbours, and worst of all...the neighbours' children!!!!!!! (regarding the latter, though, they are much less common than they once were, because most of them are sitting indoors at home playing video games all day rather than playing outside)

Are you a lonesome home despot with no one else around anymore to bully and pick on? Contact the LHDAA and get help now before it's too late!

Well, you're the guy who keeps asserting he is Mom's favorite spawn. Rank hath its responsibilities, you know. Some of us were out pursuing honest labor and other stuff.

I am just on a short break from digging a ditch in which we will plant climbing flowering plants to build a screen of delight along out back fence to assuage the neighbor down the hill who want to plonk a six foot board fencer along our property line, uglifying the whole back yard perspective. Very bad idea by a gal with a profoundly fixed idea that board fences are normal. Hopefully we will out-create her notion with a screen of lovely flowered vines that still lets the sunlight dapple through into our patio.

In the course of digging this ditch I found that PVC pipe I had laid for sprinkling the back yard hedge -- about five years back, it was. Well, at least I found half of it.

Just because someone doesn't love you the way you want them to doesn't mean they don't love you with all they have. Ralph and Edna were both patients in a mental hospital. One day while they were walking past the hospital swimmingpool, Ralph suddenly Jumped into the deep end.

He sank to the bottom of the pool and stayed there.

Edna promptly jumped in to save him. She swam to the bottom and pulled him out. When the Head Nurse Director became aware of Edna's heroic act, she immediately ordered her to be discharged from the hospital, as she now considered her to be mentally stable.

When she went to tell Edna the news she said, 'Edna, I have good news and bad news. The good news is you're being discharged, since you were able to rationally respond to a crisis by jumping in and saving the life of the person you love. I have concluded that your act displays sound mindedness.

The bad news is Ralph hung himself in the bathroom with his bathrobe belt right after you saved him. I am so sorry, but he's dead.'

Now Amos.... Shame has the mind of an infant, and you don't teach an infant by capital punishment. I think I'll simply call some friends in, say, Sudbury and arrange for them to simply kick the shi...rearrange his face to a more pleasing aspect. The other would entail FAR FAR too much work for the local street cleaners and would leave Shame so very severely depleted in mass he might well blow away.

They say "How odd--he is usually driven by a chauffeur in his El Dorado!"

Shane, your tongue has been wagging too much and has stretched so far you are running the risk of wrapping it around your own neck. It may not have been brought to your attention, but in the world, people die when they grow too offensive to other people. Is that what you want?

They say, "Gee, there goes another veteran, going up to the Hovel for for a 32 ounce mug of good beer for half a dollar. Wow, I wish I could belong to the Idaho Legion!"

But you know something, Shame? I'll betcha our Legion friends in Gore River, Little Current, and Espanola would LOVE to talk to you about your disparaging remarks about veterans. You get quite a kick out of such a talk...several, in fact.

You know what you are Rap? You are a flippin' dissgrace, eh? A flippin' dissgrace! You hang arrownd with total flippin' idiots at this awefull place they call the Hovel. What is that? A hotel for Hos? I figger not, coz it sounds like there is only dirty and crazy old men there ecskept for some flippin' old hag that is in charge of the place and calls herself a general commadner or somethin' like that. The fact that you like spendin' yer time with them sort of people tells me that you are a flippin' dissgrace to all humanity and not worth as much as a dog. You got nothin' to boast about. If I was you I would ware a flippin' bag over my head when I went outside and pretend that I was, like, somebody else. I am real glad that I am up here in God's country of North Ontario and not livin' anywheres near that dump you keep talkin' about...the Hovell.

I got respect here, man. When I walk down the street people say, "Look! There is Shane McBride. He is soooo flippin' cool! He is the most ellagi...eligaqb...the most flippin' coolest bachedlor in this hole town, eh? Gosh, I wish I was like Shane."

Well, when he's sober enough not to fall in, yes. Usually we call him "Patty-Cake" Pater. When he's cadged enough drinks you'll never guess what his favorite little game is. He's also a noted essayist and aesthete. I can't provide the full experience because the original is hand-engrossed in crayon:

You mean THE Walter Pater? The one who lives under the porch of the Legion Hovel and cadges drinks from various people by pretending to be a troll, like "The Three Billy Goats Gruff"? THAT Walter Pater?

A [ast-life trauma, revivified by commonality of smells and feelings in the Spring. Going off to war just when love was blooming, or something like that. Terrible tragedy and loss, enough to make the boldest man crumple into abject apathetic indifference.

But still, the flame!! The flame!!

"To burn always with this hard, gem-like flame, to maintain this ecstasy, is success in life."

I've been having a very tough time keeping my own spirits up in the last couple of months. It seems to happen every Spring in much the same way around April-May-June. I'm beginning to think it may be caused by a pollen allergy, since that's when the pollen starts getting in the air.

Either that or there's some psychological trigger buried deep in my subconscious regarding that time of the year. If so, I've no idea what it would be. I suspect it's the pollen that's doing it.

Gee, Amos. I've been retired now for better than two years, but I have the self-discipline and strength of character necessary that's needed. I have, to paraphrase Marty Buber*, "seen the whirlpool" but I embraced it rather than structuring it out of existence.

I've been facing that same conundrum for years now, Amos. Yes, it is a bit of a challenge to be entirely self-motivating. Sometimes I think of running away to join an ashram or some place like that, just so that someone else would more or less force me to hold to some kind of daily routines. Too much freedom can lead to confusion.

There are, as you say, all of those things one could do. But what if one doesn't want to?

If your mores were half as habile as your ego sum, life would be brighter.

I gotta tell ya, this whole retirement thing is looking strange and scary. See, I won't have to drive down the road, use a pass-key, climb up to my wee office, log in using WIndows, and write technical documents for eight hours a day. I won't be surrounded by nice folks who cheerfully agree I exist. The whole framework of ordinary routine is going by the boards. I will be free to see, think, and act as I please, but the scary part is, what if I don't please?

I mean I could find a hundred and one things to do. I could study programming, or math, or robotics, or physics. I could record songs or write new ones. I could write deathless tomes on the paucity of human understanding. I could develop the great American metaphysics (about time!) or fix up an old boat and sail the Pacific coast. I could learn cabinet-making skills, or sculpture. I could form a research foundation or go to Africa to build water distillation plants. Brush up on my French. A hundred things are possible!

But what if I don't want to? WIthout the network of expectation, I will have to be entirely self-motivated, depending on no-one else's demands or definitions. Self-defining. Now that's scary.

But I am determined to tough it out, to face the storm and pass through the eye thereof, to seek the clear waters on the other side.